| Date | Literature | America | Europe |
| 1603 | James I succeeds Elizabeth I (England). | ||
| 1607 | Capt. John Smith founds Jamestown colony (Virginia). | ||
| 1608 | John Smith, True Relation . | English Puritans flee to Holland. | 1610 | Louis XIII succeeds Henry IV (France). |
| 1612 | (?) Anne Bradtreet born in England. | ||
| 1618 | Thirty Years' War begins over control of German territory. | ||
| 1620 | Mayflower Compact. | Mayflower arrives in Cape Cod Bay. Plymouth (Massachusetts) colony founded under William Bradford. | |
| 1621 | Philip IV succeeds Philip III (Spain). | ||
| 1625 | New Amsterdam (New York after 1667) founded by Dutch. | Charles I succeeds James I (England). | |
| 1630 | John Winthrop, A Model of Christian Charity . William Bradford begins writing Of Plymouth Plantation (finished 1647). |
Arabella arrives in Massachusetts Bay. Anne Bradsteet aboard.
Massachusetts Bay Colony founded. |
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| 1633 | Maryland founded as Catholic colony. | ||
| 1636 | (?) Mary Rowlandson born in England | Connecticut and Rhode Island founded as alternative communities to Boston. | |
| 1637 | René Descartes, Discourse on Method . | ||
| 1638 | New Hampshire, Delaware (orig. New Sweden) founded. | ||
| 1640 | Bay Psalm Book : first book printed in America | Frederick William, the Great Elector, of Brandenburg-Prussia. | |
| 1642 | (?) Edward Taylor born in England. | Civil War breaks out in England between Parliament and Monarchy. | |
| 1643 | Louis XIV succeeds Louis XIII (France). | ||
| 1646 | Charles I surrenders to Parliamentary army (England). | ||
| 1648 | Peace of Westphalia ends Thirty Years' War. Ascendence of France, decline of Spain and Holy Roman Empire. | ||
| 1649 | John Winthrop dies. | Charles I beheaded, House of Lords abolished, and British Commonwealth established under Oliver Cromwell. | |
| 1650 | Anne Bradstreet, The Tenth Muse Lately sprung up in America. Or, Severall Poems, compiled with great variety of Wit and Learning, full of delight . | George Fox founds the Society of Friends (Quakers). | |
| 1651 | Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan . | ||
| 1653 | North Carolina founded. | Cromwell establishes Protectorate (England). | |
| 1660 | Restoration of English monarchy, Charles II takes throne | ||
| 1663 | South Carolina founded. | ||
| 1664 | New Jersey founded. | ||
| 1665 | Charles II succeeds Philip IV (Spain). | ||
| 1668 | Portugal achieves independence from Spain. | ||
| 1670 | Population of colonies: 110,000. | ||
| 1672 | Anne Bradstreet dies | ||
| 1676 | King Philip's War. | ||
| 1678 | Anne Bradsteet, Several Poems Compiled . . . By a Gentlewoman in New-England (posthumous). | ||
| 1682 | Mary Rowlandson, The Sovereignty & Goodness of
GOD, Together, With the Faithfulness of His Promises Displayed; Being a
NARRATIVE of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson,
Commended by her, to all that desires to know the Lord's doings to, and
dealings with her .
Edward Taylor begins writing his Preparatory Meditations before my Approach to the Lord's Supper (discovered 1937). |
Pennsylvania founded under William Penn as Quaker colony. | |
| 1685 | (?) Edward Taylor, God's Determinations Touching His Elect: And the Elects' Combat in Their Conversion, And Coming Up To God In Christ: Together With the Comfortable Effects Thereof . | James II succeeds Charles II (England).
Revocation of Edict of Nantes (France), Huguenots flee oppression. |
|
| 1687 | Isaac Newton, Principia Mathematica . | ||
| 1688 | Glorious Revolution, William and Mary succeed James II
(England).
Death of Frederick William of Brandenburg. |
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| 1689 | War of the League of Augsburg begins.
Peter I (the Great) ascends Russian throne. |
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| 1690 | John Locke, Two Treatises on Government . | ||
| 1691 | Plymouth and Massachussets Bay colonies merge. | ||
| 1692 | Witch trials in Salem. 20 women hanged. | ||
| 1697 | War of the League of Augsburg ends. | ||
| 1700 | Population of colonies: 250,000. | Philip V succeeds Charles II (Spain). | |
| 1701 | Frederick I crowned King of Prussia. | ||
| 1702 | Cotton Mather, Magnalia Christi Americana . | War of Spanish Succession begins.
Anne succeeds William III (England). |
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| 1704 | Boston News Letter : first American newspaper | ||
| 1706 | Benjamin Franklin born in Boston. | ||
| 1711 | Mary Rowlandson dies. | ||
| 1713 | War of Spanish Succession ends.
Frederick William I succeeds Frederick I (Prussia). |
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| 1714 | George I succeeds Anne (England). | ||
| 1715 | Louis XV succeeds Louis XIV (France). | ||
| 1722 | Ben Franklin, Silence Do-Good Papers . | ||
| 1725 | Death of Peter the Great (Russia). | ||
| 1727 | George II succeeds George I (England). | ||
| 1728 | William Byrd's Dividing Line expedition. | ||
| 1729 | Edward Taylor dies. William Byrd begins writing History of the Dividing Line, Run in the Year 1728 and The Secret History of the Line . |
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| 1732 | Georgia founded by James Oglethorpe as debtor's haven. | ||
| 1740 | Great Awakening. | War of Austrian Succession begins.
Frederick II (the Great) succeeds Frederick William I (Prussia). Maria Theresa ascends Austrian throne. |
|
| 1741 | Jonathan Edwards, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God . | ||
| David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding . | |||
| 1744 | William Byrd dies. | ||
| 1746 | Ferdinand VI succeeds Philip V (Spain). | ||
| 1748 | War of Austrian Succession ends. | ||
| 1749 | Benjamin Franklin's kite experiment. | ||
| 1756 | French and Indian War/Seven Years' War begins | ||
| 1759 | Charles III succeeds Ferdinand VI (Spain).
Voltaire, Candide . |
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| 1760 | Population of colonies: 1.6 million. | George III succeeds George II (England). | |
| 1762 | Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract .
Catherine II (the Great) ascends Russian throne. |
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| 1763 | French and Indian War/Seven Years' War ends.
Treaty of Paris gives Britain control over most of North America. |
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| 1764 | Sugar Act imposed on colonies. | ||
| 1765 | Stamp Act imposed, provokes violent protests and boycotts. | ||
| 1766 | Stamp Act repealed. | ||
| 1770 | Boston Massacre, 5 killed by British troops. | ||
| 1771 | Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin , Part 1
written.
Charles Brockden Brown born. |
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| 1773 | Philis Wheatley, Poems . | Boston Tea Party. | |
| 1774 | Mother Anne Lee founds Shakers in New York | Louis XVI succeeds Louis XV (France). | |
| 1776 | Thomas Paine, Common Sense .
Thomas Jefferson, Declaration of Independence . |
War of American Independence begins. | |
| 1782 | J. Hector St. John de Crevecoeur, Letters from an American Farmer . | ||
| 1783 | Treaty of Paris (negotiated by Franklin, John
Adams, John Jay) ends War of American Independence.
United States of America recognized. |
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| 1784 | The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin , Part 2 written. | ||
| 1786 | Philip Freneau, Poems . | Shay's rebellion in Massachussets. | Frederick William II succeeds Frederick the Great (Prussia). |
| 1787 | "Publius" (Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John
Jay), The Federalist .
Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia . |
Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia. | |
| 1788 | Charles IV succeeds Charles III (Spain). | ||
| 1789 | Constitution ratified.
George Washington elected first President of USA. |
French Revolution begins. | |
| 1790 | Benjamin Franklin dies. | Edmund Burke, Reflections on the revolution in
France .
Johann von Goethe, Faust . |
|
| 1791 | William Bartram, Travels through North and South Carolina, Georgia, East and West Florida, the Cherokee Country, the Extensive Territories of the Musculges, or Creek Confederacy, and the Country of the Chactaws, Containing an Account of the Soil and natural productions of Those Regions, Together with Observations on the Manners of the Indians . | Bill of Rights adopted. | |
| 1792 | George Washington re-elected. | French Republic established. | |
| 1793 | Louis XVI executed by guillotine.
Slavery abolished in French colonies. |
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| 1794 | Whiskey Rebellion. | ||
| 1796 | John Adams elected. | Death of Catherine the Great (Russia). | |
| 1797 | Frederick William III succeeds Frederick William II (Prussia). | ||
| 1798 | Charles Brockden Brown, Wieland . | William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Lyrical Ballads . | |
| 1799 | Charles Brockden Brown, Ormond , Arthur Mervyn (Part 1), and Edgar Huntley . | Napoleon declared First Consul of France. | |
| 1800 | Charles Brockden Brown, Arthur Mervyn (Part 2). | Thomas Jefferson elected. | |
| 1803 | Louisiana Purchase.
Lewis and Clark expedition. |
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| 1804 | Nathaniel Hawthorne born in Salem, Mass. | Thomas Jefferson re-elected. | Napoleon crowns himself Emperor of France. |
| 1807 | Slave trade outlawed in England. | ||
| 1808 | James Madison elected. | Ferdinand VII succeeds Charles IV, Jospeh Bonaparte succeeds Ferdinand VII (Spain). | |
| 1810 | Charles Brockden Brown dies. | ||
| 1811 | Harriet Beecher Stowe born. | ||
| 1812 | James Madison elected.
War of 1812 begins |
Grimm's Fairy Tales . | |
| 1813 | Ferdinand VII restored (Spain). | ||
| 1814 | Napoleon abdicates, Louis XVIII restored to throne (France). | ||
| 1815 | War of 1812 ends. | Battle of Waterloo, Napoleon defeated for final time. | |
| 1816 | James Monroe elected. "Era of Good Feelings." | ||
| 1818 | Frederick Douglass born. | ||
| 1819 | Washington Irving, The Sketch Book .
Walt Whitman born on Long Island. Herman Melville born in New York. |
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| 1820 | James Monroe re-elected.
Missouri Compromise. Jospeh Smith founds Mormon church in New York. |
George IV succeeds George III (England). | |
| 1823 | James Fenimore Cooper, The Pioneers, or the Sources of the Susquehanna; A Descriptive Tale . | James Monroe proclaims "Monroe Doctrine" (non-interference by/with European powers). | |
| 1824 | John Quincy Adams elected. | Charles X succeeds Louis XVIII (France). | |
| 1825 | First railway constructed in England. | ||
| 1826 | James Fenimore Cooper, The Last of the Mohicans . | ||
| 1828 | Andrew Jackson elected. | ||
| 1830 | Emily Dickinson born in Amherst, Mass. | William IV succeeds George IV (England).
Revolution in France, Charles X abdicates, Luis Philipe crowned King. |
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| 1831 | Edgar Allen Poe, Poems . | Jackson proceeds with forced removal of Native Ameicans
from southeastern states to terrirtories across Mississippi River, the
Trail of Tears (lasts through 1837).
Nat Turner's rebellion. |
|
| 1832 | Andrew jackson re-elected. | Reform Bill in England expands suffrage. | |
| 1833 | Slavery abolished in British colonies.
Isabella II succeeds Ferdinand VII (Spain). |
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| 1834 | Texas secedes from Mexico and is admitted to the US. | ||
| 1836 | Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nature . | ||
| 1837 | Nathaniel Hawthorne, Twice-Told Tales . | Victoria succeeds William IV (England). | |
| 1839 | Edgar Allen Poe, Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque . | ||
| 1840 | Brook Farm commune established. | Frederick William IV succeeds Frederick William III (Prussia). | |
| 1841 | James Fenimore Cooper, The Deerslayer .
Ralph Waldo Emerson, Essays . |
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| 1845 | Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an
American Slave .
Edgar Allen Poe, The Raven and Other Poems . |
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| 1846 | Nathaniel Hawthorne, Mosses from the Old Manse . | ||
| 1848 | Revolution in France, Second Republic established. Louis
Napoleon Bonaparte elected president.
Karl Marx, Communist Manifesto . Revolutions in Vienna, Prague, Hungary, and Prussia. |
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| 1849 | Henry David Thoreau, A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers , "Resistance to Civil Government." | ||
| 1850 | Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter . | ||
| 1851 | Nathaniel Hawthorne, The House of the Seven Gables
.
Herman Melville, Moby-Dick, or The Whale . |
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| 1852 | Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Blithedale Romance .
Harriet Beecher Stowe, Uncle Tom's Cabin; or Life among the Lowly . |
Louis Napoleon assumes title of Emperor of France (Napoleon III). | |
| 1854 | Henry David Thoreau, Walden, or Life in the Woods . | ||
| 1859 | Charles Darwin, Origin of Species . | ||
| 1860 | Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Marble Faun . | ||
| 1861 | Civil War begins. | William I succeeds Frederick William IV (Prussia).
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| 1863 | Abraham Lincoln, "Gettysburg Address". | ||
| 1864 | Nathaniel Hawthorne dies. | First International. | |
| 1865 | Abraham Lincoln assassinated.
Civil War ends. |
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